


Enough

by kate882



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Angst, I'm not crying but Oikawa sure is, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-03-01
Updated: 2016-03-01
Packaged: 2018-05-24 02:26:56
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,534
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6138206
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kate882/pseuds/kate882
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Oikawa didn’t want to be the best at everything like everyone seemed to think he did. He put his all into everything in the hopes that he would be the best at something. Anything, really.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Enough

Oikawa and Iwaizumi didn’t start out as friends. Theoretically they should have, since they lived next door to each other, were the same age, and were in the same class. But Oikawa was . . . weird. 

Everyone liked Oikawa, but he wasn’t anyone’s best friend. Every time the class paired up in groups of two, Oikawa was one of the kids who stood around waiting for the teacher to pair him with someone unless someone else’s best friend was sick.

Oikawa was smart, but not as smart as he let everyone think. Iwaizumi had heard him asking his older brother to teach him subjects before they learned them, so he was always ahead in class.

Oikawa smiled. A lot. It freaked Iwaizumi out a little.

Oikawa either didn’t have a bedtime or broke the rule, because several times Iwaizumi had woken up in the middle of the night to get a glass of water and looked out his window to find Oikawa watching the stars through his own window.

Oikawa also called him Iwa-chan instead of Haijme or Iwaizumi, despite Iwaizumi telling him not to several times.

Iwaizumi didn’t get involved with him any more than he had to, until one day he was playing explorer and ended up behind the shed that housed the school’s PE equipment. What he found behind that shed was Oikawa, huddled up into a ball on the ground with his knees to his chest and his arms wrapped around them as sobs wracked his body.

Iwaizumi considered walking away. Oikawa clearly didn’t want people to know he was crying if he was hiding behind the shed, but Oikawa noticed him before he could walk away. His eyes went wide, and he quickly used his sleeves to dry his face, giving Iwaizumi a smile that brought a very worrying realization down on him. It was the same smile that Oikawa almost always wore, and it would have been just as convincing as it always was if Iwaizumi hadn’t just seen him crying and couldn’t still see the tear tracks on Oikawa’s face. “Iwa-chan, what are you doing back here?” he asked, voice cracking a little, but if he noticed he didn’t act like it.

“Playing explorer. What are you doing?” Iwaizumi answered with a frown.

“Hide and seek,” Oikawa lied smoothly.

“You were crying,” Iwaizumi said bluntly, not willing to humor Oikawa’s lie. The teacher had told them that lying was bad.

“I was not!” Oikawa argued, despite Iwaizumi still being able to see the evidence of crying on his face.

“Did you get hurt or something? You should tell the teacher if you did.”

“I’m  _ fine, _ ” Oikawa insisted.

They stared each other down, and Iwaizumi was the one to relent first. He wasn’t sure if it was pity or something else that made him extend the offer, but the words were out of his mouth before he could stop them. “Do you wanna play explorer with me?”

Oikawa looked relieved. “Sure. How do I play?”

After that they were friends. Oikawa was still weird, but Iwaizumi put up with it.

* * *

That wasn’t the last time he found Oikawa crying, but Oikawa was never willing to share what was wrong. He considered the idea that Oikawa was being bullied, but everyone still liked Oikawa well enough.

It took a while for Iwaizumi to figure it out, but eventually he got the idea. Oikawa didn’t think he was enough. At anything. There was always someone with better grades, more friends, more attractive—that one was arguable—more athletic, more  _ something.  _ Oikawa didn’t want to be the best at everything like everyone seemed to think he did. He put his all into everything in the hopes that he would be the best at  _ something _ . Anything, really. But he was never quite there. Someone was always a step ahead of him. 

At first glance no one would think he thought of himself like that. Most people just thought he was arrogant, and wouldn't look close enough to see that he was so insecure that he worked harder than anyone Iwaizumi knew to appear perfect.

But hard work didn't always win in the face of genius. Kageyama Tobio and Ushijima Wakatoshi were perfect examples of that for Oikawa. Iwaizumi could see Oikawa tearing himself apart, and he couldn’t do anything about it. It killed him. The best he could do was promise that they’d eventually win, and it wasn’t a promise he was sure he could keep.

He found a Shiratorizawa acceptance letter in Oikawa’s waste basket in their third year while they were hanging out and he went to throw away a candy wrapper. “Why is this in the trash?” He asked Oikawa, picking up the letter and holding it up for him to see.

Oikawa didn’t look up from his computer, but the slight tightening of his jaw gave away that he knew exactly what Iwaizumi was talking about. “Because I’m not going.”

Iwaizumi’s eyebrows furrowed. “Why not?” Shiratorizawa could finally bring Oikawa to the level he wanted in volleyball. He could be great there. And as far as Iwaizumi knew that was all Oikawa really wanted.

Oikawa did look up at him this time, pushing his glasses up his nose and looking at Iwaizumi the same way he had back in first grade when Iwaizumi had insisted that the sun wasn’t a star because it was called ‘the sun’. “You didn’t get in. Why would I go?” he said as if Iwaizumi was missing something vital, and Iwaizumi felt like he really was.

“So? What does that have to do with you going?” Iwaizumi felt out of the loop, and he didn’t like it.

It wasn’t the right thing to say. He could see Oikawa starting to shut him out as he looked back at his computer. “It doesn't matter.”

This was territory he knew how to deal with. Oikawa shutting him out was something that usually happened when Oikawa was upset about something. Iwaizumi was used to working information out of him. He complained nonstop about the little things, but when something really bothered him he tried to keep it to himself.

He pulled Oikawa’s chair away from the computer, turning it to face him and leveled Oikawa with an even stare. Oikawa stared right back.

“I’m not letting you go back to your computer until you tell me what’s up,” Iwaizumi told him.

“I wasn’t doing anything important.”

“You’re not leaving this chair until you tell me what’s up,” he rephrased.

They went back to staring, and eventually Oikawa cracked. “I’m not going because I don’t want to go to highschool without you. You’re more important than Shiratorizawa.”

Iwaizumi reviewed his words that had upset Oikawa with that information in mind. He’d gotten pretty good at figuring out how Oikawa thought over the years. It took a moment, but he figured it out. He had made it sound like he didn’t care if he went to school with Oikawa or not. “I don’t want to be the one to hold you back. I’d still see you all the time. We live next door to each other, but I don’t want you to not go because of me and regret it,” he told Oikawa.

“I won’t. I know what I want. I want to beat Ushiwaka and Tobio-chan, and I want to do it with you by my side.” Oikawa kissed him.

* * *

Being a couple wasn’t that different from being friends for them. They still hung out, they just called it dates instead. They held hands sometimes, but they’d done that before when one of them was upset. Kissing was different, but it was nice.

They went to Aoba Josai together, and Oikawa turned a good team into a great one. But . . . it still wasn’t enough.

_ “You should have come to Shiratorizawa.” _

Iwaizumi had never wanted to hit someone as bad as he had wanted to hit Ushijima right then for the absolutely broken look he’d put on Oikawa’s face.

When everyone else had cleared out of the locker room, Iwaizumi held Oikawa as the setter cried into his chest and quietly asked him, “Why can’t I be good enough?”

It was only six words, but they absolutely broke Iwaizumi’s heart to hear Oikawa say them through his tears, voice breaking at the end.

“We’ll win next time.” It was a promise he would try his best to keep.

After that it was near impossible to drag Oikawa out of the gym. He was constantly overworking himself. Pushing himself. Trying to be good enough to beat Shiratorizawa. Iwaizumi had to drag him out of the gym constantly, and he still ended up hurting his knee. Luckily it wouldn’t be permanent—this time. The warning didn’t seem to hold any weight to Oikawa. He kept pushing himself. Kept trying. Kept practicing.

And they still lost. Each time.

They didn’t even get to play Shiratorizawa in their final year, because Kageyama’s team beat them before they could. And then, as if to add insult to injury, Karasuno beat Shiratorizawa as well.

Again, he tried to comfort Oikawa after the game, but this time, he couldn’t say that they would win the next one.


End file.
